Barbeque grills for cooking meats and other food items are common home appliances. Generally, such grills comprise an upwardly opened housing for containing a source of heat such as charcoal or gas burners, and a parallel bar grill surface for supporting food adjacent the open end of the housing over the heat source. When food is cooked on such grills, it is desirable that grease drippings be allowed to fall onto the heat source and evaporate. The smoke from the evaporated drippings adds a smokey flavor to the food that is enjoyed by many people.
Unfortunately, when grease drippings fall onto charcoal or open flame gas burners, grease fires within the housing of the grills often results which cause food to be burned and to have an undesirable taste. Control of grease fires within the grill housing while simultaneously permitting grease drippings to fall onto a hot surface and evaporate has been a persistent problem in the art.
Attempts to control grease fires within the housing of a grill while permitting drippings to evaporate have been made. Examples include interposing an array of grease catching grates between the heat source and the food, interposing perforated ceramic blocks between the food and the heat source and simply increasing the depth of the grill housing so that the flames emitted from small grease fires are not as likely to contact the food. These methods of controlling grease fires within the grill have not always been satisfactory because the presence of an open flame in the grill housing from the gas burner or from hot charcoal tends to ignite grease that collects on grease collecting grates and ceramic blocks. Increasing the depth of the grill housing is helpful but increases the amount of heat necessary for cooking and results in a large, heavy and difficult to use barbeque qrill.